Terms & Legal

With effect from 31st January 2013 the standard default terms on which our Members have previously offered their services were withdrawn by the Bar Standards Board. The default standard terms under which Members of Cornwall Street Barristers offer services to, or at the request of, solicitors (or other persons authorised and regulated by the Law Society or the SRA) will be the Standard contractual Terms 2012 (updated for the GDPR in 2018) that have been prepared by the Bar Council.

Please note that in the absence of any other agreement between you and the Barrister these standard terms will govern the relationship between the Barrister and the authorised person.

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Please read the following information carefully. This privacy notice contains information about the information collected, stored and otherwise processed about you and the reasons for the processing. It also tells you who Chambers shares this information with, the security mechanisms Chambers has put in place to protect your information and how to contact Chambers in the event you need further information.

We will always protect, respect and safeguard your personal information and your privacy whilst also ensuring any other partners with whom we share your data with also abide by our high operating standards.

For the purpose of the General Data Protection Regulations, the data controller is Cornwall Street Limited, 85 – 87 Cornwall Street, Birmingham, B3 3BY. We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office under registration number Z1779020.

Who Are We?

Cornwall Street Barristers is a trading name of Cornwall Street Limited and Beaumont Chambers Limited whose registered details are below. Our Head of Chambers is Mr Andrew Tucker.

Chambers collects, uses and is responsible for personal information about you. When Chambers does this is it the “controller” of this information for the purposes of the GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018.

If you need to contact Chambers about your information or the processing carried out you can use the contact details at the end of this document.

How Does Chambers Collect And Process Your Information?

Chambers collects some or all of the following personal information that you provide:

The same categories of information may also be obtained from third parties, such as members of Chambers, experts, members of the public, your family and friends, witnesses, courts and tribunals, suppliers of goods and services, investigators, government departments, regulators, public records and registers.

How Chambers Uses Your Personal Information: Purposes

Chambers may use your personal information for the following purposes:

a. To promote and market the services of barristers
b. To train barristers
c. To recruit staff and pupils
d. To assess applications for tenancy, pupillage, mini-pupillage ad work-shadowing opportunities
e. To fulfill equality and diversity and other regulatory requirements
f. To procure goods and services
g. To manage matters relating to employment, including payroll and pensions
h. To respond to requests for references
i. To publish legal judgments and decisions of courts and tribunals
j. To respond to potential complaints or make complaints
k. To carry our anti-money laundering and terrorist financing check
l. As otherwise required or permitted by law.

a. Names, contact details and name of organisation
b. The nature of your interest in Chambers’ marketing
c. Your attendance at Chambers events.

This will be processed so that you can be provided with information about Chambers and the Barristers and to invite you to events. You may contact Chambers using the contact details at the and of this document if you no longer wish to receive such invitations or information. You may also unsubscribe or update your marketing preferences by clicking the “unsubscribe” link in all marketing materials we send you by email.

Whether Information Has To Be Provided By You, And Why

If you apply for a position at Chambers your personal information has to be provided to Chambers so that your application/reference can be processed and properly assessed. It also allows employment records, pay and pensions to be processed and also to enable Chambers to comply with its regulatory obligation to keep accounting records.

If you are offering or providing Chambers with goods and services your information may be processed in relation to such offers or contracts.

The Legal Basis For Processing Your Personal Information

Under GDPR guidelines Chambers have an obligation to clearly explain how we operate, what processes we follow and also on what authority we process your personal information. Operating under instructions either directly from yourself, or under the direction of a solicitor, we would generally have a “contractual” basis for lawfully processing your personal information.
This may on occasions not be the appropriate lawful basis for processing, such as when we ate instructed to process your personal information on behalf of a legal authority such as the Crown Prosecution Service.

When instructed to do so, we may also be processing on “Legal Obligation” and there may also be occasions whereby we may process your personal information under “Legitimate Interests”.

Any marketing campaigns we complete wold usually operate and send marketing information under the terms of “Legitimate Interest” whereby the professional client has previously instructed us to act within the last three years. If this is not the case then we would be operating using “Consent” and this can be freely withdrawn at any time using the “Unsubscribe” link in our emails.
Consent can also be withdrawn at any time either from legitimate consent or explicit consent via telephone, post or email and we never collect any automated opt-in customer databases.

Further Information On The Legal Basis For Processing

Chambers relies on the following lawful basis for the collecting and processing of your personal information:

a. In relation to information in categories (i) to (q) above (these being categories which are considered to include particularly sensitive information and which may include information about criminal convictions or proceedings) Chambers are entitled by law to process the information where the processing is necessary for legal proceedings, legal advice, or otherwise for the establishment, exercise or the defence of legal rights.
b. In relation to information which is not in categories (i) to (q) above Chambers relies on its’ legitimate interests and/or the legitimate interests of a third party in carrying out the processing for the purposes set out above.
c. The processing is necessary for the assessment of your working capacity or health, safety or social car purposes.
d. The processing is necessary for the prevention or detection of unlawful acts where it is un the substantial public interest which must be carried out without consent so as not to prejudice the purpose.
e. In certain circumstances processing may be necessary in order for Chambers to comply with a legal obligation to which is subject (including carrying out money-laundering or terrorist financing checks).
f. The processing is necessary for the purpose of performing or exercising obligation or rights which are imposed or conferred by law on Chambers or on you in connection with employment, social security or social protection.
g. The processing of information in categories (i), (j), (l) and (n) is necessary for the purposes of identifying or keeping under review the existence or absence of equality of opportunity or treatment between members of staff, tenants, pupils and mini-pupils with a view to enabling such equality to be promoted or maintained.

Who Will Chambers Share Your Personal Information With?

It may be necessary to share your information with the following:

a. Information processors, such as IT support staff, email providers, information storage providers
b. In the event of complaints the Bar Standards Board and the Legal Ombudsman
c. Other regulatory authorities
d. Current, past or prospective employers or employees
e. In the case of recruitment of barristers to or from other Chambers, your current, past and prospective Chambers
f. Education and examining bodies
g. Legal professions
h. Experts and other witnesses
i. Prosecution authorities
j. Courts and Tribunals
k. Chambers’ staff
l. Trainee barristers
m. Lay and professional clients of members of Chambers
n. Family and associates of the person whose personal information Chambers is processing
o. Current, past or prospective employers
p. Business associates, professional advisers and trade bodies, e.g. the Bar Council
q. The intended recipient, where you have asked Chambers to provide a reference
r. The general public in relation to the publication of legal judgments and decisions of Courts and Tribunals.

Chambers may be required to provide your information to regulators such as the Bar Standards Board, the Financial Conduct Authority or the Information Commissioner’s Officer. In the case of the Information Commissioner’s Office, there is a risk that your information may lawfully be disclosed by them for the purpose of any other civil or criminal proceedings, without Chambers’ consent or your consent, which includes privileged information. Chambers may also be required to disclose your information to the police or intelligence services, where required or permitted by law.

Sources Of Information

The personal information Chambers obtains may include information obtained from:

a. Legal professions
b. Experts and other witnesses
c. Prosecution authorities
d. Courts and Tribunals
e. Trainee barristers
f. Lay and professional clients of members of Chambers
g. Family and associated of the person whose information Chambers is processing
h. In the event of complaint, the Head of Chambers, the Bar Standards Board and the Legal Ombudsman
i. Other regulatory authorities
j. Current, past or prospective employers
k. Education and examining bodies
l. Business associates, professional advisers and trade bodies, e.g the Bar Council
m. The intended recipient, where you have asked Chambers to provide a reference
n. The general public in relation to the publication of legal judgments and decisions of Courts and Tribunals
o. Data processors, such as IT support staff, email providers, data storage providers
p. Public sources, such as the press, public registers and law reports.

Transfer Of Your Information Outside The European Economic Area (“EEA”)

The privacy notice is of general application and as such it is not possible to state whether it will be necessary to transfer your information out of the EEA in any particular case or for a reference. However, if you reside outside the EEA or your case or the role for which you require a reference involves persons or organisations or Courts and Tribunals outside the EEA then it may be necessary to transfer some of your information to that country outside of the EEA for that purpose. If you are in the country outside the EEA or if the instructions you provide come from outside the EEA then it is inevitable that information will be transferred to those countries. If this applied to you and you wish additional precautions to be taken in respect of your information then please indicate this when providing initial instructions.

Some countries and organisation outside the EAA have been assessed by the European Commission and their information protection laws and procedures found to show adequate protection. Most do no though. If your information has to be transferred outside the EEA then it may not have the same protections and you may not have the same rights as you would within the EEA.

Chambers may transfer your personal information to the following which may be located outside the EEA:

a. Cloud information storage services based in the USA who have agreed to comply with the EU-US Privacy Shield, in order to enable us to store your information and/or backup copies of your information so that Chambers may access your information when we need to. The UA does not have the same information protection laws as the EU but the EU-US Privacy Shield has been recognised by the European Commission as providing adequate protection.
b. Cloud information storage services based in Switzerland, in order to enable us to store your information and/or backup copies of your information so that we may access your information when we need to. Switzerland does not have the same information protection laws as the EU but has been recognised by the European Commission as providing adequate protection.

How Long Will Chambers Store Your Personal Information

Our policies state that direct access (or public access) clients’ data shall be held for 6 years after the completion date of the contract. Generally, standard cases (when instructed via a solicitor) shall be held for 7 years after the completion date.
Retention policies for other types of personal data are also specified in our Retention Policy which can be provided upon request.

Consent

As explained above, Chambers is relying on your explicit consent to process your information in categories (g) to (o) above. You provided this consent when you applied to become a members of staff, tenant, pupil or mini pupil or when you asked Chambers to provide a reference.

You have the right to withdraw this consent at any time but this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing activity carried out prior to you withdrawing your consent. However, where Chambers also relies on the other bases for processing your information, you may not be able to prevent processing of your information.

If there is an issue with the processing of your information please contact Chambers using the contact details below.

Your Rights

Under the GDPR you have a number of rights that you can exercise in certain circumstances. These are free of charge and in summary you may have the right to:

a. Ask for access to your personal information and other supplementary information
b. Ask for correction of mistakes in your information or to complete missing information Chambers hold on you
c. Ask for your personal information to be erased, in certain circumstances
d. Receive a copy of the personal information you have provided to me or have this information sent to a third party. This will be provided to you or the third party in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, e.g a word file
e. Object at any time to processing of your personal information for direct marketing
f. Restrict the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances

If you want more information about your rights under the GDPR please see the guidance on the Information Commissioner’s Website.

If you want to exercise any of these rights you may do so by contacting Chambers using the contact details at the end of this privacy notice. Chambers may need to ask you to provide other information so that you can be identified so please provide a contact address so that we can contact you should we need to. You will be asked to provide proof of your identity and address.
Chambers will respond within one month from when we receive your request.

Marketing Emails

If you wish to unsubscribe from any marketing emails that you have signed up for then you can do so by following the instructions at the bottom of any marketing email.

Automated Decision-Making

Chambers does not use any automated decision-making tools.

Future Processing

Chambers will not process your personal information except for the reasons stated within any agreement with you. If there is a change of requirement for this process then you will be requested to allow and authorise this change.

Changes To The Privacy Notice

This privacy notice was published on 12 June 2018 and last updated on 12 June 2018.

Chambers continually reviews its privacy practices and may change this policy from time to time. When it does an amended privacy notice will be placed on our website.

Contact

If you have any questions about this privacy notice or the information Chambers holds about you then please contact our Data Protection Manager using the contact details below.

Please read the following information carefully. This privacy notice contains information about the information collected, stored and otherwise processed about you and the reasons for the processing. It also tells you who the Barristers share this information with, the security mechanisms they have put in place to protect your data and how to contact them in the event you need further information.

Barristers collect, use and are responsible for personal information about you. When they do this, they are the “controller” of this information for the purposes of the GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018. All Barristers are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office under their own registration number.

If you need to contact them about your data or the processing carried out you can use the contact details at the end of this document.

What Do They Do With Your Information?

When carrying out the provision of legal services or providing a reference they collect some or all of the following personal information you provide:

Personal details.

Family details.

Lifestyle and social circumstances.

Goods and services.

Financial details.

Education, training and employment details.

Physical or mental health details.

Racial or ethnic origin.

Political opinions.

Religious, philosophical or other beliefs.

Trade union membership.

Sex life or sexual orientation.

Genetic data.

Biometric data for the purpose of uniquely identifying a natural person.

Other personal data relevant to instructions to provide legal services, including data specific to the instructions in question.

Information Collected From Other Sources

The same categories of information may also be obtained from third parties, such as other legal professionals, experts, members of the public, your family and friends, witnesses, courts and tribunals, investigators, government departments, regulators, public records and registers.

How Do They Use Your Personal Information: Purposes

Barristers may use your personal information for the following purposes:

To provide legal services to their clients, including the provision of legal advice and representation in Courts, Tribunals, Arbitrations and Mediations.

To keep accounting records and carry out office administration.

To take or defend legal or regulatory proceedings or to exercise a lien.

To respond to potential complaints or make complaints.

To check for potential conflicts of interest in relation to future potential cases.

To promote and market their services.

To carry out anti-money laundering and terrorist financing checks.

To train other Barristers and when providing work-shadowing opportunities.

To respond to request for references.

When procuring goods and services

To publish legal judgments and decisions of Courts and Tribunals.

As required or permitted by Law.

Whether Information Has To Be Provided By You, And Why

If Barristers have been instructed by lay clients directly or by solicitors on their behalf or if they have been asked for a reference, your personal information has to be provided to enable them to provide you with advice, representation or the reference. This will also enable them to comply with their professional obligations and to keep accounting records.

The Legal Basis For Processing Your Personal Information

Barristers rely on the following as the lawful bases on which they collect and use your personal information:

If you have consented to the processing of your personal information, then they may process your information for the purposes set out above to the extent to which you have consented them to do so.

If you are a client, processing is necessary for the performance of a contact for legal services or in order to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contract.

In relation to information which is in categories (g) to (o) above (these being categories which are considered to include particularly sensitive information and which include information about criminal convictions or proceedings) they rely on your consent for any processing for the purposes set out in purposes (b), (d), (f) and (g) and (i) above. Barristers need your consent to carry out processing of this data for these purposes. However, if you do not consent to processing for purposes (d) or (g) (responding to potential complaints and providing a reference) the Barrister will be unable to take your case or to provide a reference. This is because they need to be able to retain all the material about your case until there is no prospect of a complaint and to provide an informed and complete reference.

In relation to information in categories (g) to (o) above (these being categories which are considered to be particularly sensitive information and include information about criminal convictions or proceedings), Barristers are entitled by law to process the information where the processing is necessary for legal proceedings, legal advice, or otherwise for establishing, exercising or defending legal rights.

In relation to information which is not in categories (g) to (o) above, they rely on their legitimate interest and/or the legitimate interests of a third party in carrying out the processing for the purposes set out above.

In certain circumstances processing may be necessary in order that they can comply with a legal obligation to which they are subject (including carrying out money-laundering or terrorist financing checks).

The processing is necessary to publish judgments and other decisions of Courts or Tribunals.

Who Will They Share Your Personal Information With?

If you are a client, some of the information you provide will be protected by legal professional privilege unless and until the information becomes public in the course of any proceedings or otherwise. As a Barrister they have an obligation to keep your information confidential, except where it otherwise becomes public or is disclosed as part of the case or proceedings.

If may be necessary to share your information with the following:

Data processors, such as their Chambers staff, IT support staff, email providers, data storage providers.

Other legal professionals.

Experts and other witnesses.

Prosecution authorities.

Courts and Tribunals.

The staff in their Chambers.

Trainee Barristers

Lay Clients

Family and associates of the person whose personal information they are processing.

In the event of complaints, the Bar Standards Board, and the Legal Ombudsman.

Other regulatory authorities.

Current, past and prospective employers.

Education and examining bodies.

Business associates, professional advisers and trade bodies, e.g. the Bar Council.

The intended recipient, where you have asked them to provide a reference.

The general public in relation to the publication of legal judgments and decisions of Courts and Tribunals.

Data processors, such as their Chambers staff, IT support staff, email providers, data storage providers.

Public sources, such as the press, public registers and law reports.

Transfer Of Your Information Outside The European Economic Area (EEA)

This privacy notice is of general application and as such it is not possible to state whether it will be necessary to transfer your information out of the EEA in any particular case or for a reference. However, if you reside outside the EEA or your case or the role for you require a reference involves persons or organisation or courts and tribunals outside the EEA then it may be necessary to transfer some of your data to that country outside of the EEA for that purpose. If you are in a country outside the EEA or if the instructions you provide come from outside the EEA then it is inevitable that information will be transferred to those countries. If this applies to you and you wish additional precautions to be taken in respect of your information please indicate this when providing initial instructions.

Some countries and organisation outside the EEA have been assessed by the European Commission and their data protection laws and procedures found to show adequate protection. Most do not. If your information has to be transferred outside the EEA, then it may not have the same protection and you may not have the same rights as you would within the EEA.

Barristers may transfer your personal information to the following which are located outside the EEA:

Cloud data storage services based in the USA who have agreed to comply with the EU-US Privacy Shield, in order to enable them to store your data and/or backup copies of your data so that they may access your data when they need to. The US does not have the same data protection laws as the EU by the EU-US Privacy Shield has been recognised by the European Commission as providing adequate protection.

Cloud data storage services based in Switzerland, in order to enable for them to store your data and/or backup copies of your data so that they may access your data when they need to. Switzerland does not have the same data protection laws as the UE but has been recognised by the European Commission as providing adequate protections.

If a Barrister decides to publish a judgment or other decision of a Court or Tribunal containing your information then this will be published to the world.

They will not otherwise transfer personal information outside the EEA except as necessary for providing legal services or for any legal proceedings.

If you would like any further information please use the contact details at the end of this document.

How Long Will They Store Your Personal Data?

Our policies stat that direct access (or public access) client’s data shall be held for 6 years after the completion of the contract. Generally, standard cases (when instructed by a solicitor) shall be held for 7 years after the completion date.

Retention policies for other types of personal data are also specified in our Retention Policy which can be provided upon request.

Consent

As explained above, Barristers rely on your explicit consent to process your information in categories (g) to (o) above. You provided this consent when you agreed that the Barristers would provide legal services / you asked for them to provide a reference.

You have the right to withdraw this consent at any time, but this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing activity they have carried out prior to you withdrawing your consent. However, where they also rely on other bases for processing your information, you may not be able to prevent processing of your data. For example, if you have asked them to work for you and they have spent time on your case, you may owe them money which they will be entitled to claim.

If there is an issue with the processing of your information then please contact their clerks using the contact details below.

Your Rights

Under the GDPR, you have a number of rights that you can exercise in certain circumstances. These are free of charge. In summary, you may have the right to:

Ask for access to your personal information and other supplementary information;

Ask for correction of mistakes in your data or to complete missing information they hold about you;

Ask for your personal information to be erased, in certain circumstances;

Receive a copy of the personal information you have provided to them or have this information sent to a third party. This will be provided to you or the third party in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, e.g. word format;

Object at any time to processing of your personal information for direct marketing;

Object in certain other situations to the continued processing of your personal information;

Request not to be the subject to automated decision-making which produces legal effect that concern you or affects you in a significant way.

If you want more information about your rights under the GDPR please see the Guidance from the Information Commissions Office on their website.

If you want to exercise any of these rights, please:

Use the contact details at the end of this document;

We may need to ask you to provide other information so that you can be identified;

Please provide a contact address so that you can be contacted to request further information to verify your identity;

Provide proof of your identity and address;

State the right or rights that you wish to exercise.

We will then respond to you within one month when we receive your request.

How To Make A Complaint

The GDPR also gives you the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Officer if you are in the UK, or with the supervisory authority of the Member State where you work, normally live or where the alleged infringement of data protection laws occurred. More information on how to make a complaint can be found on the Information Commissioner’s website.

Automated Decision-Making

The Barristers do not use any form of automated decision-making.

Future Processing

Barristers will not intend to process your personal information except for the reasons stated within this privacy notice. If this changes, this privacy notice will be amended and placed on our website.

Changes To This Privacy Notice

This privacy notice was published on 14 June 2018.

Barristers continually review their privacy practices and may change this policy from time to time. When they do it will be update and placed on our website.

Contact Details

If you have any questions about this privacy notice or the information the Barristers hold about you, please contact the Chambers Data Protection Manager, James Farmer, on 0121 233 7500 or on email to j.farmer@cornwallstreet.co.uk.

Chambers is committed to providing a working environment in which all individuals who come into contact with Chambers are treated with dignity, respect and fairness. Chambers aims to promote a working environment which is conducive to the professional growth of its members and employees and to the promotion of equality of opportunity.

Chambers will not tolerate any form of harassment. Harassment constitutes professional misconduct and is prohibited by the Bar Council’s Code of Conduct. Harassment on the grounds of sex, race, disability, sexual orientation or religion is unlawful under the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, the Race Relations Act 1976, the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, the Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003 and the Employment (Religion and Belief) Regulations 2003.

Diversity Data

In line with the Bar Standards Board’s Equality and Diversity Rules, Cornwall Street Chambers hereby publishes a summary of the data collected in 2016 in respect of gender, disability and race. The information below shows data for both members of Chambers (including QCs and pupils) and employed staff.

All members of Chambers and employed staff were invited to respond to the confidential questionnaire. Those who chose not to respond are included as ‘undisclosed’.

This data is valid as of 23rd June 2016. We are required to publish up to date information every three years.

If you have any questions or queries about this data please contact Simon Bradshaw, Chambers Equality and Diversity Officer (and Diversity Data Officer), on 0121 233 7500 or simon.bradshaw@cornwallstreet.co.uk.

Cornwall Street Barristers 2016

Gender
Female 32%
Male 62%
Undisclosed 6%

Disability
Disability 6%
No disability 85%
Undisclosed 9%

Race
White 91%
BME* 6%
Undisclosed 3%

Company Details

Cornwall Street Barristers is a trading name of Cornwall Street Limited (Birmingham and Shrewsbury) and Beaumont Chambers Limited (Oxford) whose registered addresses are 85 – 87 Cornwall Street, Birmingham, B3 3BY. Cornwall Street Limited is incorporated in England and Wales under registration number 04174329. Beaumont Chambers Limited is incorporated in England and Wales under registration number 08840163. A full list of members for both companies is available for inspection at each office.